Mar 09, 2001 06:20 AM
3586 Views
Last month I took a flight from Chennai to Sydney – transit point is at Kuala Lampur.
since this is my first trip abroad – I was fascinated by the beauty of KL Airport – compared to the sydney airport I think KL is much much bigger – since we have to walk along big corridors there are lot of escalators for that.There is also a mini train to carry us across platforms. There is a big shopping centre inside the Airport which is tax-free – you can get almost anything you want.
Now the bad things happened there – I found out the authorities are not very friendly here, I reached KL airport around 7.00AM in the morning – the transit flight to sydney is at 10.00Am,I stood in a queue to get the boarding pass – there they are asking some unnecessary questions as if I am going to enter Malaysia and they don’t know english well , there was an old man who is having US passport (he is indian)
Has been harassed by the officials – since you don’t need a visa from US to visit Aus , there is no visa stamped in his passport , since the officals are ignorant(!) about this they put him into really pathetic situation , instead of cowing down he said that he is going to sue them for harassing him – then they begged pardon and let him go around 9.50 Am – the second call to boarding sydney flight was over ,so the poor man has to rush to get into the flight in nick of time.
I was very tired – so I slept immediately in the flight , to my horror after 2 hours – the flight is still in KL airport – due to a technical snag ,then they asked everyone to alight from the aircraft – as it would go only in the night 8.00pm
Remember I am in Malaysia boarding an Malaysian airlines can’t they arrange for another flight there ?
They arranged us a hotel in Shah Alam to stay – then a bizarre thing happened except indians others were given temp visa to enter malaysia within minutes , but for us they made to stand in a one queue which is very big one, I stood there for 4 long hours before reaching the hotel at 5.00pm – its one hour drive from the airport – since I have to come back by 8.00pm – I just took bath and ate something in the hotel and rushed back to get into the flight again to sydney,it was no problem for me as I am a bachelor but you should think about the women and crying children - it was terrible.I don’t know why the old man from USA was also asked to stand there with us – even though he was an US citizen ,only problem was he was an indian, I think there is some kind of racial discrimnation for indians.
I just wanted to share my experience with my fellow mouthshut members, without any prejudice for malaysia.I had a very nice(!) experience in my first trip to abroad which would linger in my memory through out my life *.
